


Prometheus

by the_random_writer



Series: Movie Night [4]
Category: Cut & Run - Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux
Genre: Affectionate Insults, Arguing, Crack, Idiots in Love, Insults, M/M, Movie Night, Snark, Television Watching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-10-01 15:49:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17247005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_random_writer/pseuds/the_random_writer
Summary: It's movie night in the Grady and Garrett household, and interesting conversations abound...Hoping to make this an ongoing thing - each new 'Movie Night' story will cover the boys watching a different movie.I'm not a fan of the chapter system, so will publish each story standalone within a series.This installment will make slightly more sense if you've seen the movie in question :-)





	Prometheus

On the screen, the blonde woman looked over her shoulder and broke into an ungainly run.

On the couch, Zane grunted and rolled his eyes so hard he almost checked out his own (beautiful) ass. Huffing loudly, he stabbed the Pause button on the remote and gestured, no, _gesticulated_ at the television. "This is the dumbest thing I have _ever_ seen," he proclaimed, glaring at Ty as if the problem was all his fault.

"Just a crappy sci-fi movie, babe. No need to get so upset."

Unfortunately, far from calming the beast, Ty's words were a red flag to a bull.

"Do _not_ tell me not to get so upset," Zane stiffly said, raising a warning finger. "If you were allowed to be annoyed by _Hot Tub Time Machine_ , I'm allowed to be annoyed by this illogical piece of crap."

"C'mon, babe. It's not _that_ bad."

So far, this one wasn't shaping up to be the best of the _Alien_ movies. Nothing would ever beat the second one with the kickass marines, but it hadn't been as balls-to-the-wall weird as the fourth one, either.

Zane speared him with a tight-lipped glare. "Meow Mix, this is the _dumbest_ fucking story about the _dumbest_ fucking people going to the _dumbest_ fucking place to do the _dumbest_ fucking things. Trust me, it _is_ that bad."

"What the hell are they doing that's so dumb?"

"You want the short version, or the long one?"

Ty grinned and playfully flashed his brows. "When you're involved, Lone Star, it's _always_ the long one."

"Funny."

"Let's stick to the short version," Ty said. He knew how much Zane loved to crunch his numbers, so it was almost a given that his list of problems with the movie would be as long as his arm. If the two of them were going to die on the living room couch, he wanted it to be from having insanely strenuous sex, not of boredom-induced suicide or, even worse, extreme old age.

Zane waved at the television again. "Okay, well, how about the fact that instead of waiting until the following morning to start poking around on the planet, they decide to go out exploring almost as soon as they land, even though they know they only have a couple of hours of daylight left?

"Like you'd be willing to sit and wait if you were on an alien planet," Ty said. "We both know the minute _you_ landed, you'd be streaking out the front door with your shoelaces barely tied, waving your hands in the air, shouting 'I saw it first, I saw it first!'"

"Like _hell_ I would."

Ty cocked a disbelieving brow and gave his husband a 'really' glare.

Zane scrunched his nose and waved him away. "Okay, scratch that one, then. But how about the fact that literally _five fucking minutes_ after they've gone into the cave, they're taking their goddamn helmets off? Even though the scans from the ship told them the planet's atmosphere was toxic?"

Ty shrugged. "The sensors told them the air in the cave was breathable. Air is air. What's the fucking problem?"

"Air is air? _Really_ , Meow Mix?"

"Air is air, yeah."

"Okay, why don't you go stand in a room with an open container of anthrax spores for a couple of hours, wait a few days, see how you feel about your horseshit 'air is air' theory then."

Ty waved a dismissive hand. "Eh, whatever. Anthrax, schmanthrax. Can't be any worse than the dose of crypto I had at the end of last year." Even mentioning the 'C' word again made him shudder slightly. Thank the Lord for a house with two heads and luxury, moistened toilet paper…

" _Then_ they decide to take the huge, leaky alien head back to the ship for examination, without _once_ stopping to think about basic quarantine procedures."

"They _did_ put a big plastic case around it," Ty pointed out.

"Yeah, _after_ they were back on the ship, and only when they realized something bad was about to happen. Like deciding to put a rubber on when you realize you're two seconds away from losing your load."

That mental image made Ty snicker. "Okay, I'll maybe give you that."

"Then there's biologist dude who absolutely _shits_ himself when he finds the Engineer's decapitated body, but wants to play Best Fucking Friends Forever with the freaky alien snake, even though the Engineer was more or less human-looking, but the snake is something straight out of a fucking Lovecraft novel?"

"It wasn't _that_ scary."

Zane speared him with another glare. "Grady, it managed to look like a penis _and_ a vagina at the same time. And it had _teeth_. We both know that if you bumped into something like that in the alley behind One Eyed Mike's, you would take a dump down one leg of your pants and run screaming into the harbour."

"Wouldn't be the first time I had an accident in the alley behind One Eyed Mike's," Ty admitted. And it probably wouldn't be the first time the alley had seen a penis or a vagina, either. Although, he doubted it had ever seen a penis or a vagina with teeth. Fell's Point was weird, but it wasn't _that_ weird.

"Do I even _want_ to know what the hell that meant?"

Ty waved the question away. "Was back before we met. Probably better if you don't." He waved at the television. "You were saying?" he prompted.

Fortunately, instead of pursuing the accident story, Zane swallowed the redirection bait.

"None of the so-called scientists in this movie behave in a _remotely_ scientific way," he pointed out next. "They're even worse than the dumbass kids in that shitty horror flick we watched last night, who at least had the excuse of not being old enough to know one end of a can of common sense from the other. Why the _fuck_ would a company as large as the Weyland Corporation choose a bunch of surly, uncooperative, immature, passive-aggressive, money-grubbing _assholes_ to man a first-of-a-kind, potentially bankrupting, trillion dollar, interstellar mission? Do you have _any_ idea how much psychological testing NASA candidates go through? None of those guys would even have been allowed to clean the toilets back at HQ, much less be given a posting on the ship."

"The FBI uses psychological testing as part of its recruitment process," Ty pointed out.

"Yeah, and?"

"And we both figured out how to work around it."

And by 'how to work around it', Ty really meant 'how to avoid being caught lying like a goddamn rug'.

"Meaning?" Zane asked.

"Meaning, maybe the guys in this movie did the same thing. Maybe, as well as being surly, uncooperative, immature, passive-aggressive, money-grubbing assholes, they're also manipulative as hell and smart as fuck, so they all knew _exactly_ how to hide the things they didn't want the shrinks to see. Maybe they all wanted to go into space as much as _we_ wanted to be out in the field instead of stuck behind a goddamn desk."

Zane glowered and huffed, reluctantly conceding the point. "I suppose," he muttered. He smiled and wagged a triumphant finger. "But that doesn't explain how someone can have their whole abdomen sliced open, then get up and run away barely a minute later." He crossed his arms, sat back, and nodded smugly at Ty, challenging him to figure it out.

"The medical machine stitched her stomach back together."

"The top layer of muscles, yeah. There was no sign of it repairing all the muscle layers underneath."

Ty tried not to roll his eyes. Zane was into full-on nitpicking mode, now. "Just because you didn't see it doesn't mean it didn't happen," he said, using one of his husband's own favourite excuses against him. "As Bow Tie Science Guy likes to remind us, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."

"Meow Mix, this is a _bit_ more complicated than who does or doesn't swap out the rolls of toilet paper," Zane complained, glaring again to make it clear he knew _exactly_ what Ty was doing. "Which, by the way, I do _just_ as often as you, regardless of what you and your OCD brain thinks."

"If you say so, hoss."

Ty counted the toilet rolls. He wasn't convinced.

Perhaps remembering how the last turn at this discussion had gone, Zane sensibly chose to change the topic. "Okay, what about the asshole cartographer guy?" he asked next. "How can you get lost in a cave when you're the one responsible for making the maps?"

"Just because you're a guy who makes maps doesn't mean you automatically have a good sense of direction."

"Seems to me it would be a basic requirement for the position."

"You'd think that," Ty acknowledged. "But I also think you're not really in a position to complain about other people having no sense of direction."

Zane frowned. "The fuck does _that_ mean?"

"Garrett, the last time you parked in a multi-storey car park, you got lost trying to find your way back to the car. You were gone so long I almost had to call the security guys to ask them to send out a rescue party."

"Not _my_ fault all the levels looked exactly the same."

"Yeah, well, maybe in this alien place, all the _tunnels_ look exactly the same."

"Okay, _fine_ , but why would you even go _into_ the cave before the map-making drones had finished their work? Wouldn't it be much safer to wait for them to produce a full layout analysis first?"

"Cus we've never _once_ done something in advance of having all the information we need to do it."

Quite the opposite, in fact. Back in the day, jumping out the back of the plane when they only had one leg in the 'chute had become something of a Standing Operating Procedure for them. Although, in their defense, usually because they were gonna die if they didn't, not because they thought it was the right thing to do.

Defeated by his husband's illogical logic again, Zane huffed, recrossed his arms and slumped into his corner of the couch.

Just as Ty was reaching to press the Play button, Zane raised another objection.

"If the aliens are so advanced, why does their recording system produce images that looked like they came out of the 1950s?" he griped. "I know it's 3D, but I haven't seen video footage that shitty and grainy since I was a kid."

"Maybe they're not big movie watchers in Weirdo Alien Land. Maybe, they've all been so busy with their freaky weapons and DNA seeding shit, they haven't gotten around to inventing High Def 1080p, so they're all still working on 420 instead."

The questions kept coming.

"Why is the medical thing calibrated for male patients only? Other than plumbing stuff to do with vaginas and wombs, how different can a female patient be?"

"I'll give you that one," Ty said. "I mean, when it came down to it, scientist lady's emergency was _kind_ of a pregnancy problem, but she still figured out how to tell the machine to get rid of the thing."

"Thank you," Zane exclaimed, slapping the arm of the sofa to make the point.

"Still doesn't mean it's a totally shitty movie."

Zane rolled his eyes and muttered something vulgar under his breath. "Okay, why was the Engineer dude so fucking angry when they woke him up?"

"Seriously, Lone Star? You're actually complaining about _that_?"

"Why the fuck shouldn't I?"

"Uh, maybe cus the last time I woke you up before dawn, I was so worried about how badly you would react, I had to stand at the door and prod you with a goddamn broom?"

Zane huffed. "Not _my_ fault I'm not a morning person," he muttered.

"Good thing you're married to a golden ray of sarcastic morning sunshine like me, then, isn't it?"

"'Good' wasn't the word that immediately came to mind, no."

"You saying you _don't_ want me to wake you up at the crack of dawn by gently prodding you with a broom?"

"Would much rather you gently prodded me with something else."

Ty snickered. "You mean a warmer kind of wood?" He leaned in to steal a quick kiss. "You ask me nicely the night before, I'm sure that could be arranged," he murmured into Zane's mouth.

Zane sighed and snaked one hand around Ty's neck, pulling him closer to deepen the kiss. He settled the other hand on Ty's thigh, moving it slowly towards his groin.

Ty felt his pulse start to race. Ten to fifteen more seconds of this, and they would have to watch the rest of the (dumb or not) movie tomorrow…

Zane froze, then pulled away, frowning.

"What's wrong?" Ty asked.

"Why did the Engineer have to sacrifice himself to seed the planet with DNA?" Zane asked. "Couldn't he have just brought the DNA with him in a thermal flask? It's like finding out Prometheus gave fire to humans by setting himself on fire."

Ty let out a strangled groan. "Garrett, I swear to God, you ask me one more _fucking_ question about this movie, I'm gonna set _you_ on fire."

"You knew what you were getting into when you married me, doll," Zane pointed out, holding up surrendering hands. "You know how hard it is for me to let go of a problem once it's worked its way into my brain."

Ty pulled away, ordering his groin to behave, all thoughts of romance now gone. Zane was right, and the only way to work this out was to see it through to the bitter end. "Maybe the dude did it for the aesthetic. Maybe pouring it out of a flask wouldn't have been extra enough for him."

Zane snorted. "So, what, he's an alien edgelord, yeah?"

"Dissolving into a puddle of jizz over the side of a waterfall seems pretty goddamn edgy to me."

"Speaking of people being edgy, why the _fuck_ did the Engineers need to play a goddamn flute to start up their spaceship computers?"

Surprisingly, Ty actually had a good answer for that. "You mentioned a while ago that music is just mathematics in audio form, right?"

"Yeah, and?"

"And Bow Tie Science Guy says mathematics is the only truly universal language."

"Yeah, so?"

"So, it makes perfect sense that a musical instrument could be what they use to start up their computers. It's, like, their freaky, advanced, alien version of an RSA fob."

Zane narrowed his eyes. "You _so_ just pulled that out of your ass."

"Did not."

"Did too."

"Not _my_ fault you haven't been blessed with a mind as dazzlingly creative as mine."

Zane's brows shot up. "Oh, is that what we're calling it now? _Dazzlingly creative_? Cus where I come from, we usually go with something polite like 'only having one oar in the water' instead."

Ty shrugged. "Yeah, well. Where _you_ come from, it's against the law to buy a realistic-looking dildo."

"That's only Dallas," Zane said. "And where _you_ come from, it's _not_ against the law for men to have sex with an animal as long as it's under forty pounds."

"Really?"

Zane nodded. "You didn't know that?"

"Can't say I did."

"Just think how much more enjoyable your teenage years would have been if you did. You could've asked your folks to buy you a couple of pet turkeys for Christmas."

"Now who's the funny one?"

Zane dipped his head and held his arms wide as if graciously accepting an honour.

"We done bitching?" Ty asked, waving the remote at the screen. "Can we get back to watching the movie?"

Zane nodded. "Think I'm all out of objections for now." He cocked a brow. "Unless you have any you wanna raise?"

"Nope."

Ty pressed the Play button. Then almost immediately pressed the Pause button again. "Actually, now you mention it…"

"Jesus, these are gonna be beauties, aren't they?" Zane muttered.

"You know what scene I didn’t like?"

"There was just one?"

"The bit right at the start, where the android dude's watching the scientist lady's dreams."

"That was kinda creepy, yeah."

"Not that."

"Then what?"

"Her dreams were _way_ too clear and rational to be realistic. Everyone had their underwear on, nobody's feet were glued to the ground, and there were no giant T-Rexes running around in the back."

"Pretty sure that's just you, doll."

"The fuck does that mean?"

"I mean I'm pretty sure normal people don't dream about dinosaurs. _Or_ about putting their sandwiches on red alert."

Ty felt himself blush. "C'mon, man, that was one time," he grumbled.

"On the subject of sandwiches, yeah." Zane patted his leg. "Don't worry, doll. I know it's harmless. Just because you talk in your sleep doesn't automatically mean you're as mad as a bag of snakes."

"It runs in families, you know," Ty said, feeling slightly defensive. "You think _I'm_ bad, try spending a night with Deacon instead. One time, when we were kids, he came into my room and said 'Don't worry, it's just the light. Mom doesn't really think you're a girl.'"

Zane snickered. "Twenty bucks says it's a Grady thing, and Chester talks in his sleep as well."

"Probably about putting his shovels on red alert."

"Anything else about the movie offend you? Or was it just the not-quite-weird-enough dreaming scene?"

Ty nodded. "One other bit."

"What was that?"

"The scene where the Captain and Blondie go off to do the beast with two backs instead of staying up on the bridge to keep an eye on the crew," Ty said. "Unprofessional as shit, given the situation. Bordering on negligent, even." He snorted slightly. "You ever did that on _my_ watch, there'd be hell to pay after."

"To be fair, she's pretty hot."

"Who?"

"Blondie." Zane waved at the screen, still frozen on the running scene. "Whatshername. You know. Charlie. Charleen. Charlotte. Whatever the fuck she's called."

She was indeed. But she wasn't the only stellar body in sight. "He's pretty hot as well," Ty said.

"What, Captain guy?"

Ty nodded. "Wouldn't kick him out of bed in a hurry. Not even for eating toast."

As B. Tyler Grady compliments went, that was an _extremely_ high rating indeed. Second only to 'not even for farting in an elevator'. Which, incidentally, he'd recently discovered was illegal in some parts of Texas as well.

Zane huffed. "You don't let _me_ eat toast in bed."

"That's cus you're actually here, and I can always think of much better things to put in your mouth."

"Anyone ever told you what a classy guy you are?"

"I'm from West Virginia, and I used to be a Marine. Classy's my middle name."

"I'm saying nothing."

"Good. Maybe now you've caught a bad case of shut the fuck up, we can watch the end of this fucking movie?"

Zane nodded. "Just watch, though," he warned, gesturing at the frozen image again.

"Watch what?"

"What happens in the next part of this scene."

"What'd you mean?"

"She's running away from the huge alien ship rolling towards her, right?"

"Right?"

"I bet you whatever amount of money you'd care to name she's gonna keep running straight ahead, instead of veering off to the side."

Ty sneered. "That's a sucker bet. Nobody's that dumb. Not even me."

"Put your money where your mouth is, Grady."

Ty's lips twitched. "How about instead of my money, I put my _mouth_ where my mouth is?" he counter-proposed. A win-win situation for him, since he enjoyed giving almost as much as receiving.

"So, whoever's right about what happens next blows whoever's wrong?"

"Exactly."

Zane shrugged. "Works for me if it works for you."

"You ready?" Ty asked, making a show of picking up the remote.

"I'm ready."

Ty pressed the Play button. He watched in mild disgust as his husband's predictions came perfectly and painfully true. When the rolling spaceship finally ran over Blondie, Zane punched his hands in the air.

"And, it's a punt return from his own endzone for Garrett," he crowed. "Team Grady can suck my balls. Figuratively and literally, it seems." He turned to Ty, face plastered in a shit-eating grin. "Ready whenever you are, babe."

"You don't want to watch the rest of the movie first?"

"Based on how stupid as fuck the first hour and forty-six minutes were? Not really, no."

Ty checked the movie info. "There's only another ten minutes to go." He really wanted to wrap it up, not because it was a great movie, but to keep his completeness squirrels happy. He hated the nagging feeling he got in the back of his brain when he didn't see a task through to the end.

"You _really_ want to watch to the end?"

"Um, kinda, yeah?"

Zane nodded and stroked his chin. "So, you're telling me that if I stood up, took off all my clothes and started to play with myself right here on the couch, you'd completely ignore me and finish watching the movie instead?"

Hmm.

On second thoughts, the squirrels and the movie could wait.

Grinning, Ty jabbed the Pause button again. "Jesus, Lone Star, when you put it like _that_ …"


End file.
